marquee moon by Television

I played that third album today..

I remember now: it wasn't the 'modern production values', it was the feeling that it all (well, 90% of it) could be a Lloyd Cole and the Commotions album, songwriting, vocals,the lot.

i like the third album just fine, but i highly recommend tracking down the Live at the Academy 1992 disc they sold at shows for a minute ... think it's even on Spotify.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fI4ve8KkO0I

Having read Lloyd's piece, I found myself sympathising with Verlaine though that clearly wasn't the intent.

I saw them on the self-titled album tour, down in Washington DC. I had to go by myself, nobody was interested. But holy cow, it was one of the greatest shows I have ever seen. They were just so intense.

Fast forward about a decade later, I saw them again in NY. This time I had a bunch of friends. We left about 30 minutes into it. Slow, dull, no energy and they took about 10 minutes between each song to retune.

My friend put it best, "Tom Verlaine seems like he'd rather be playing shuffleboard."

I love that kilbey blog post
He hasn't deleted his blog in general has he?

Discogs has a French promo single, unissued tracks, dated just after the issue of the third album.

Anyone know anything about it? Or is it a bunchafibs?

https://img.discogs.com/mbfz_8LScBRlDZUpOaPGUqfgjMw=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-2839065-1303387370.jpeg.jpg

Tracklist .

1 The Revolution 3:13
2 Big Jo 0:35
3 Hoo

I have found a review, which I nick and repeat here:

This was released with copies of the Self-titled album when it came out in some French department store. It's extremely rare, so naturally one would wonder: is it any good?

Unfortunately no.

All of the tracks are spoken word. The first two are intermittently interesting to listen to one time but are total garbage. Not even songs. The last one sounds like Captain Beefheart or something, spoken word with an occasional song part thrown in. I love some of his music so maybe I'm too kind towards this, because I think with about a minute cut off, it'd be a decent song.

Also the drum sound is shockingly good. These two things each raise the rating by half a star. The last official Television studio release, and it's a complete throwaway -they clearly didn't take this release seriously-. Shame Tom Verlaine lost his mind, they were one of my favorite bands of all time. Hell, the live bootleg from around 2002 of unreleased tracks ("Call Mr. Lloyd" is the name and you can listen to it here: http://www.earcandyarchive.com/?p=24 ) is fantastic, so they clearly could make a successful comeback if they wanted. Sadly Tom is so nuts he hears aural flaws nobody else does whenever he tries to make a new album with the band. Resulting in: an excessively sterile/muted sound (on self-titled he'd only gotten to this stage), some huge fit, and lastly him scrapping everything they'd just recorded. A new album was supposed to come out around 2010 I think but it's now 2016 and not a word has been heard from him aside from occasional live shows... which used to be fantastic but are slowly getting worse.

May he find peace.

"Hoo" is 04:56 btw

that Revolution single isn't all that bad, but it's not a hidden classic or anything -- sounds like half-finished leftovers from the s/t sessions. Definitely not worth the $90 they're asking on Discogs.

A nice post-script to the evolution of "Marquee Moon" would be the live 13:58 version from the 1982 live disc on The Miller's Tale comp, just because the recording is so good, and an interesting example of Verlaine solo.

I think its the same as on the 12" b-side of "The funniest thing"

Edit: Apparently not, its from 1987, but its still good though.

Oh, "Revolution"is on it!

Riiiiight....

Yeah, that 1982 gig is stellar. I think Tyler has some bootlegs that are equal to it on his site.

This one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMOyNTk5WZM

6-4-82 at the Ritz does not quite have the sound quality of the millers tale gig but the intensity is even higher. On that MM, Verlaine takes a striking unaccompanied solo.

Bowery Ballroom 2006 is also a fantastic Verlaine band live recording showing what that year's songs album could do

i wrote the script for this little marquee moon video -- they found a few cool pics i hadn't seen before
http://pitchfork.com/tv/56-liner-notes/1967-explore-televisions-marquee-moon-in-5-minutes/

nice!

That's awesome Tyler!

thanks, jon -- obviously nothing too revelatory for heads, but I think they did a nice job with it...

love this pic of Lloyd -- i assume it was taken some time towards the end of "Satisfaction"

https://68.media.tumblr.com/6c6b74a08980bc2a01ddc7bd953b2af1/tumblr_inline_oocqdmtQEH1qzx4na_1280.jpg

lol

Stereo Review is a good source for "what's this crap?" contemporary hot takes on 'classic' LPs pic.twitter.com/qBbqCsKnYG

— Bowiesongs (@bowiesongs) July 27, 2018

Did he. . . did he even listen to the album?

not sure anyone who’s seen the elegantly cadaverous band on the cover of the record would want any more ‘flesh tones’ than there are on there already tbh

Seems this LP and Wire’s Pink Flag we’re very heavily discussed as rock classics 20 years or so ago, and maybe not as much these days?

Are any rock classics heavily discussed these days?

The Thing

I was interested in who "N.C." might be, and after looking around a bit, found a site that archives Stereo Review for forty years:

http://www.americanradiohistory.com/HiFI-Stereo-Review.htm

Only recognized one name on the masthead circa 1977 (Steve Simels), but looks like Bangs reviewed records for them for a time. He reviews Bob Marley and Peter Tosh in the September '77 issue, also the Ramones in an earlier issue (the pages are missing on that one).

N.C. = 'Noel Coppage'

also some sweet reviews of rumours and lust for life in that thread

title track is the closest a new york band ever got to Wishbone Ash

Bangs was writing for Stereo Review at least as early as 1974, as he reviewed Quadrophenia.

Good review...They've got a search button in the top right where you can look up Bangs, or specific albums. The other thing I love is all those old Marantz and Pioneer ads. I used to look at those ads as a teenager like someone else might look at Mercedes and Porsche ads.

http://www.magazine-advertisements.com/uploads/2/1/8/4/21844100/marantz-electronics-1-1.jpg

Holy crap, $1285 today is around $7000 (and $298 just over $1600).

See No Evil just came on in Shooters Sports n Shorts bar in Leeds and I'm amazed.

xpost you could get a hell of a nice integrated stereo amp today for $1285!

The Marantz, though, came with the TK421 modification, which they'd do right in the store. You don't get that anymore.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=La3U41b0WSU

haha, great clip

That is funny. Where is it from?

Boogie Nights

haha, I'd totally forgotten about that scene, and it's not too far off from the Marantz ad copy (Gyro-Touch tuning! Built-in oscilloscope!)

To be fair, Marantz is a pretty solid investment.

Oh, I agree. I found a cheap used 1030 a few years ago, and it sounded great/worked perfectly for a few years. Tank-like, too (until one of the channels died).

Sorry, Marquee Moon, people love you and you will get your thread back soon...I started looking into where the company was now and came across this ad testifying to those tank-like qualities.

http://www.ca.marantz.com/Assets/Images/1974_Marantz_fire_ad.jpg

https://www.theringer.com/music/2022/4/13/23022787/television-marquee-moon-tom-verlaine-richard-hell

With Lloyd doubling his parts, the effect was noir-cool as opposed to exploitation-flick-thrilling